" And, as
everybody knows, it was in Germany that the standard of revolt against
the authority of Rome was first successfully raised. The political
constitution of that country was also peculiarly favourable to the
protection of the Reformation and of the persons of the early Reformers.
Although owing a nominal allegiance to the Emperor, or rather to the
will of the Diet which met annually under the presidency of the Emperor,
the head of each of the little States into which Germany was divided
claimed to be independent lord of the territory over which he ruled.
Hence, when the Ernestine line of Saxon princes took the Reformation and
the early Reformers under their protection, there was no power ready
and willing to compel them to relinquish their design. The democratic
independence of the Free Cities also made them fitting strongholds of
the new teachings.
Students of history would do well never to lose sight of the fact that
every religion which attempts to bind or to guide the reason, to direct
the lives and to determine the conscience of mankind, necessarily has an
ethical as well as a theological, a social as well as an individual
side. It concerns itself, not only with the relation of the individual
to God or the gods, but also with the relations and duties of man to
man. Hence the close relation and inter-relation of religion and
politics. Politics is the art or act of regulating the social relations
of mankind, of determining social or civic rights and duties.
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